Spur of the Moment Road Trips
by Krys33
Summary: “Sounds like we both need a little spontaneity.” There’s just a hint of wistfulness in her voice and he can’t help but see a younger Jordan, her legs curled up in her chair, her hair coming undone, ready to take on the world. JackJordan, post107, oneshot


**A/N: **I'm so glad to finally be done with this. I hope you all enjoy.  
**Disclaimer: **I'm not Aaron Sorkin; I don't own _Studio 60_.

**Spur-of-the-Moment Road Trips and Not-Really-Sick Days**  
--

"It's not true."

With a kick, he swivels his office chair around to face her, silhouetted in the doorway. He lifts his glass to his lips and takes a sip, the alcohol a racing burn down his throat, before he speaks. "What's not true?"

"The things he's saying." She shifts her weight from one foot to the other, adding, "The latest ones."

Jack breathes deep. "Danny told me."

"I actually like dogs."

He takes another sip. "Good to know."

Jordan leans against the doorframe now, arms crossed, and he almost wishes the lights were on so he could see her face.

Almost.

"You have kids, Jack?"

The question catches him off guard, and he sets the tumbler down with an echoing thump. "No."

"Do you want kids?"

He can't see her, but she can see him, he knows, and it makes him feel vulnerable.

Jack Rudolph isn't used to that.

"Yeah. I want kids."

"And Marilyn?"

Using her name and not _your wife_ is a failed attempt at acting like they're closer than they really are, and they can both tell by the way it sounds on her lips: foreign, and a little bitter.

He shrugs one shoulder wearily. "I don't know."

"You two haven't talked about it?"

Jack shrugs again, and more wrinkles appear on his shirtsleeve. "Never came up."

"Hmm."

For a split second he thinks that reply is one of the most beautiful sounds he's ever heard.

But only for a second.

Jordan looks down for a moment, then back at him. "Do you love her?"

This, too, catches him off guard, and he buys himself some time with another swig of scotch. "You want the truth, or the answer I'm supposed to give you?"

That right there is the most open he's been with anyone in years, but he finds he's not really afraid.

"The truth, if you don't mind." Even if he can't see her expression, he can hear the smirk in her voice.

"No. I don't love her." He twists the glass in his hand, watching the liquid swirl. "Anymore," he adds, as almost an afterthought.

"Then why are you still -"

The glass is halfway to his lips again, but he slams it back down on the desktop now, scotch splashing over the sides. "What the hell do you know, McDeere?"

She stands up straight, shocked by the outburst, and even a little frightened. Sure, she's seen Jack _angry_, but this is something else entirely.

"You were with that bastard Ryan for nine months. That's fucking _nothing_," there's another _bang_ as the drink hits the desk again, "compared to seven years. _Nothing_. So don't come in here all high and mighty pretending like you know all the ways of the world because you _don't_."

He finally releases his white-knuckled grip on the glass, running his hand over his face. There's silence for a moment as they both look at one another without actually _seeing_. And when he speaks again, his voice is filled with less rage and more exhaustion.

"God, Jordan. You don't realize how young you are, do you?"

It sounds more like he's talking to himself and not quite to her.

Jordan steps into the room now, shutting the door behind her and bathing the two of them in darkness.

They don't really care.

She sits in one of the chairs across from his desk, utterly ladylike in the way she crosses her legs and entwines her fingers _just so_. He clears his throat quietly, staring at a random point above her left shoulder and trying not to think about the fact that her skirt just rode up a good few inches on her thigh.

"I'm sorry."

His eyes flit to hers for a moment, then back to nothing. Even without words, they both understand he accepts her apology.

"I shouldn't have asked such personal questions. I was out of line."

"No you weren't." They lock gazes again, for longer, this time. "You were _right_."

Jack's stare moves to the pool of amber liquid on his desk, and he sighs.

"It's just not as easy as you make it sound."

She nods. "I understand."

"That's the thing, though," he tells her. "You don't. I know you think you do. You think you've been there, you think you get what _this_," he makes some indeterminable gesticulation with his hands, "is all about."

Jordan doesn't respond.

"Problem is, you never loved Ryan, did you?"

He doesn't mean to sound so bitter, but it's too late for that, now.

There's a pause. "Yes, I did."

It's obviously a lie; any fool could tell.

"No, Jordan, you didn't. It wouldn't have been so easy if you had."

"Easy?" It's her turn to yell, now, and she slams a heeled foot onto the ground in anger. "You think this is _easy_? He's running around, exposing the worst of me, Jack. And I have to sit here and _take it_ because that's what good girls _do_."

She's not a lady anymore, legs uncrossed, fingers untwined, and loose wisps of hair in her face.

"It wasn't easy then and it's not easy now. I may not have loved him, but I was young and stupid and thought that I did. So I _do_ understand, Jack. It might not look like it, but I _do_ understand."

It's eerily silent now, that ringing kind of quiet that echoes in every corner and drives you insane.

Jack lifts his glass and downs the rest of his drink. "Then you understand that I can't leave her."

She shakes her head with a quiet laugh. "But you _can _leave her. You _need_ to leave her."

Jack sighs, an exhausted, exasperated sound. "I told you, Jordan: it's not that simple."

"I didn't say it was simple, Jack. I said it's what you have to do."

Anyone else, he realizes, would've laced that with sarcasm. Jordan only sounds like she's stating the facts.

"It's a little hard to let go when you're too busy trying to hold on to something that isn't there."

That's the issue, though, isn't it? Because she and Ryan never tried to hold on, not at all.

"It won't hurt her, you know." Jordan thinks that maybe it's the darkness, the reason why this is all coming out now.

Through the black, she can see the ghost of confusion etched on his face and clarifies without being asked.

"Your wife." Less foreign, maybe, but no less bitter. "You care about her. It's why you're holding on. But letting go won't hurt her, Jack. You have to know that."

He shakes his head in that way that says _You think you know everything, don't you, McDeere?_ "She's not the one I'm worried about." He leans back, closing his eyes. "She's always been the strong one, independent."

There's a small smile on his face now, eyes still shut, and before she can stop herself, Jordan's wondering if he looks like that when he's thinking about her, too.

She sighs and looks down at her lap, folding her hands together again and trying not to bite her lip.

"What happened to us, Jack?" is what she says, but what she really means is _What happened to you and Marilyn? What happened to Ryan and me?_ and he knows it.

"We changed." His eyes don't open, but the smile disappears. "That's life."

Jordan's still staring at her knees. "I don't feel different."

"You are." He's finally looking at her again, wondering when he got so old.

"You've known me for six weeks."

"It's longer than it sounds." Jack watches her for a moment. "For the record, I like you better now."

She gives a small laugh. "That makes one of us." Finally looking up, she slides her feet out of her heels. "It's harder than it looks."

"What is?"

"Having everybody hate you."

He laughs, now. "Not everyone hates you, McDeere. Matt Albie doesn't hate you. That assistant of yours, he doesn't hate you. And Danny… Danny doesn't hate you." There's a pause as he refills his scotch. "But you know that already."

"And you, Jack?" she inquires, almost coyly.

Or maybe it's just his imagination.

Sighing, he shakes his head. "No, Jordan. I don't hate you." A shrug accompanies his next sip of alcohol. "You're not making my life any easier, though."

"Easy's overrated," she tells him with a flip of her hand. "Life would be boring if it were easy."

"I'll take boring and easy over complicated and shitty, if you don't mind."

She cocks her head to the side a little, worrying her lip between her teeth just slightly.

"What?"

"You're more predictable than you think you are."

His only response is the raise of an eyebrow.

"You like order, logic, numbers. Hard facts. Explanations." She props her bare feet up on the corner of his desk. "Am I right?"

He shrugs a shoulder. "I suppose." Leaning forward, he pushes at her ankle, knocking her feet off his desk. She rolls her eyes. "But you're predictable too, McDeere."

It's her who cocks an eyebrow this time. "Really?" The skepticism is more than evident in her voice.

"You like routine. Silver jewelry, never gold. Black coffee, two sugars. Two olives in your martini. Same dry cleaner, grocery store, gas station."

"You sound like a stalker, Jack." She tucks her bare feet underneath her body.

He shrugs again. "Just observant."

"Sounds like we both need a little spontaneity." There's just a hint of wistfulness in her voice, and he can't help but see a younger Jordan, her legs curled up in her chair, her hair coming undone, ready to take on the world.

"Speak for yourself." He knows he's too old for that, for spur-of-the-moment road trips and not-really-sick days. He had his chance.

"Come on." There's a hint of a smirk toying at her lips now. "Live a little."

"I've lived enough."

Jordan climbs out of her chair and pads over to the window, leaning up close to the glass.

"Look at all that," she tells him, the city lights reflecting perfectly off of her face, and he works hard to tell himself that this is real life, not a movie set. "There's so much out there that we haven't seen."

"All that's overrated." He doesn't bother to look out the window. He's seen the view a thousand times too many. "L.A.'s a cesspool."

She turns around and leans back against the windowsill. "Are you ever positive?"

"Are you ever _not_?"

Jordan shrugs. "No." She hops up to perch herself on the small ledge. Her legs swing to and fro and Jack wonders when he stopped being that carefree.

"Don't you get tired of being disappointed?"

"I'll tell you a secret, Jack." And she leans toward him just enough to keep her balance. "Sometimes, everything really does turn out alright."

He sighs, downs the last of the scotch in the tumbler, and pauses for a moment, empty glass in hand. "You really are naïve." His voice is soft.

"You don't believe me?" She jumps down from the windowsill, and it would've been graceful had she not faltered just the slightest bit. "Let me show you."

Jordan holds out her hand, and they stay like that for what feels like an eternity, motionless. And all of a sudden, his hand is in hers and rises to his feet.

She'd forgotten how tall he was.

He looks down at her and she grins, tugging him toward the door.

And as they walk down the hall, Jordan still barefoot in her rumpled skirt and Jack with his tie loosened, missing his suit jacket, they forget, for a moment, that they're just two small pieces in the grand scheme of the corporate world. For that moment, there's no Marilyn, no Ryan, no stuffy dress clothes, no NBS.

There's just two people, walking hand-in-hand down a florescent-lit hallway.

Now normally, here is where the credits would roll. But this isn't a movie, and this isn't the end.

The next day, they're back in those fancy clothes, dealing with hateful wives and vindictive exes and cleaning up after everyone else's mistakes and they _really_ hate it sometimes.

At the end of it all, though, Jack decides that maybe easy really is just a bit overrated, and when Jordan walks by with a shining, gold necklace around her neck, she throws him a wink over her shoulder and he thinks that maybe, just maybe, he'll call in sick tomorrow.

--

**End**


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